Lessons Learned in Knowledge Co-Production for Climate-Smart Decision-Making

Knowledge co-production, a process that involves both creators and users of information in knowledge generation, is growing increasingly popular in the conservation and ecology fields. While examples of successful co-production have become more common, many barriers and challenges remain in this work.

In a new article published by Environmental Science & Policy, "Lessons Learned in Knowledge Co-Production for Climate-Smart Decision-Making," NE CASC Research Ecologist Toni Lyn Morelli and her collaborators seek to expand understanding of how co-production can be successfully implemented by using a prominent framework for assessing and shaping this process to reflect on their own recent experiences with it. Their reflections yield insights that the authors hope will help other scientists seeking to support decision-making via co-production.

The team concludes that paying particular attention to team composition and connecting with agency representatives early and often are crucial to success. Long-term commitment to the project and the people involved are also recognized as being fundamentally important to co-production. In the final section of the article, the authors provide suggestions for refining the framework used in the article to incorporate their primary lessons learned and include the valuation of a plurality of knowledge systems and empowerment as an ultimate impact of knowledge co-production.